Episode 65 · May 14, 2023
How I figured out my niche
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In this episode
This one's a coaching call. My client came into the Academy straight out of a toxic client relationship, and the first thing she wanted was to work out who she wants to work with. She asks me how I did it for my own business, so I walk her through all of it, including the parts that took nine years and the words we scrubbed off my own website four months ago. Then I come back at the end, because there's a lesson underneath it: you don't think your way to an ideal client.
What you'll take away
- She had one whale and a handful of minnows, and it worked until it didn't. One big client covering the month, small referred ones squeezed in alongside. There's real stability in that, right up to the point where the whole thing rests on one relationship.
- Painkiller or nice to have is the first test, and naming the moment is how you pass it. Who you help, and when they need you. Someone I worked with sold it as: I help you turn your Series A round into enterprise pipeline.
- Mine took nine years and it isn't finished. I help small businesses grow, which is more vanilla than vanilla ice cream. Then women business owners. Then women who run consulting and coaching businesses. Then coaching came off the website four months ago.
- You don't figure out your ideal client by thinking about it. You figure it out by starting somewhere and then gathering data. Talking to people is data. Taking on work is data. Smart women get stuck here because thinking things through has worked for them everywhere else.
- Make the decision, then stop making the decision. Come back to it after a while, sure. Don't sit re-evaluating it while the work waits.
In this conversation
The full transcript, in sections. Open any one to read it.
Why I'm handing you a coaching call
0:02
I was convinced I don't know three, four years ago, I was like, I've got it. I have a niche. I am super clear about that. This niche is airtight, but guess what? You just get more data. Welcome to the smart gets paid podcast with me. Leah Neaderthal, I help women land higher paying clients in their independent consulting businesses, but I've never been a salesperson. My background is in corporate marketing, and when I started my first consulting business, I learned pretty quickly that it's about 1000 times harder to sell your own stuff than it is to sell someone else's. So I taught myself how to do it, and I created the sales approach that I now share with my clients so they can feel more comfortable in the sales process. Get more of the right clients and get paid way more for every client contract. So whether your client contracts are $5,000 $100,000 or more, if you want to work with more of the clients you love, do more of the work you love, and get paid more than you ever thought you could, then you're in the right place. Let's do it together. Thanks for tuning in, and don't forget to rate, review and share. Hey there, Leah here, and thanks for tuning in. I hope that wherever you're listening to this, wherever you are right now, you're having a good week, making some good progress in your business and taking some time for you. So before we dive in, I just want to thank everyone who took the time to share their kind words about episode 62 which is the episode I did with my dad. If you've listened to it, you know that I was actually a little nervous about publishing it, because I felt like since it's not purely about what I do and about sales, I thought no one would listen, and also I felt particularly vulnerable, because I wasn't just putting myself out there like I do on the podcast every other week. I was putting my dad out there too. So it took me a year to even edit and publish the episode, and I have to say, I've been so overwhelmed with the response this community, you are amazing. So if you've sent me an email or a LinkedIn message or if you've just shared the episode, I really, really appreciate it. It just, it just warms my heart. Thank you. And if you haven't listened to it yet, check it out. It's episode 62 lessons from a 30 year business owner with my dad. Bob Neaderthal, all right, so let's get into the episode. So in this episode, I'm pulling back the curtain a bit, and I'm sharing with you how I came to my niche, the women I work with, but I explain it in a bit of a roundabout way, because I'm talking to a client who's struggling to find her niche, and there's a bit of background that we've edited out for privacy, but the general gist is she's been working with clients. She's been running her business for a little while, but one client in particular, that was her biggest client, was extremely toxic. And so if you've ever been in a toxic relationship, whether it's personal or professional, you know that it kind of wrecks your sense of reality, because you start to lose touch with, who am I? What do I want? What do I like? And it absolutely wrecks your self confidence. And so having come right out of that, that's the moment that she came into the academy like that's just what she's leaving when she joins the program, and what she wants to do is reconnect and sort of rediscover for herself who she truly wants to work with and the work she wants to be doing. And in the course of that conversation, she asks me how I did it for myself and my business. And you're going to hear me talk through just about every step. So if you've ever wondered who do I even want to work with and what do I even want to offer them, then you will really feel this conversation. The other thing to know about the moment where you're dropping into this conversation is that she references a framework, and what she's referring to is our 3x profitable consulting framework, which measures your business on three levels. Financial profitability, making great money to support the life you want. Professional profitability, doing the work you love with clients you enjoy, and emotional profitability, making sure you're having fun, you have time for the things you love, and you're feeling optimistic about the future. So you'll hear her mention that early on and the profitability areas she's struggling with. So that's where we start the conversation. I want to send a huge thank you to my client for allowing me to share this conversation with you. Take a listen, and at the end, I'll come back and share a lesson you can apply to your business. What's on your mind, what's on your plate, what have you been sort of noodling on, struggling with that we can talk about today and make this a really valuable call
Where she's starting from
4:35
for you, sure. So I went back to the framework diagnostic, and just wanted to see kind of what my takeaways are, and from the the framework, the key stuff that stood out is that I wrote this to you. I'm emotionally, professionally and emotionally bankrupt right now, and so I have a lot of work to do there. I definitely. You want to learn on the financial side. And there's key things that you had mentioned that I want to laser in on, but it's the professional and the emotional stuff that needs to get lined up first. And there I think I can, I can work the financial angle with your kind of help and guidance. But the the key thing for me, which I don't know if this is true of all your clients, is I really need to start by articulating what my ideal client and work is, because I have such a mixture of work that I've done, and I'm such a generalist, and I kind of catch as catch can when it comes to business development, and so anything that you have, or in terms of resources, books or prompts to help work through this would be great. So that's kind of what I took away, like, I need to start there. I need to start at the very beginning. But once, once I am able to articulate that better, I think the other stuff, I'm just going to be so hungry to start putting stuff into practice, because, you know, I've been doing this for so long, and you just create these tools and frameworks that are very easy not to plug and play, but it's all the stuff that I can do on my own. And then if I get someone to do a first read or give feedback, I'll feel great about it and have no qualms about putting it out there, but I've just not been able to do it without a little bit of kind of coaching.
So yeah, yeah, you know, have I got it right where you are at this place where you need to sort of reconnect with what you like about what you do, so that you can figure out how you want the next engagements and all the future engagements to to be healthier and more satisfying than the past ones?
The whale and minnow model
6:49
Yes, and I even, I mean, this is probably jumping the gun, but because it was in the online module, I did the plan your pipeline segment? Yeah, and what I realized I had told you is, in order to kind of manage my energy and ability to keep up with work, but also have some diversity in my clients, I had this model that I thought was useful to me, which I call like the whale and minnow model. So I had one whale of a client that had some stable, reoccurring revenue every month, but really ended up being more like a contractor relationship versus a consulting relationship. And then I had these minnows, which were people who were referred to me by past clients or employers who needed help probably couldn't really afford my my rate, but because of their mission and their objective, and because I wanted to learn more about the space they were in, I take them on, and I'd have, I'd be able to squeeze that in alongside the whale, But now just doing your pack the or, excuse me, plan the pipeline segment, I'm realizing that that makes me overly dependent on a whale. Yeah, so I'm not sure that that the great thing about that is that I don't have to prove myself over and over again with the whale, if you can keep the relationship sweet, but you're overly dependent and anything can happen on the client side, you know, with the market environment. So I think that that transition will be hard for me, but might be worthwhile to figure out how to, like, break up my client portfolio into something a little more balanced,
if that makes sense. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's, it's not uncommon. A lot of people get into this, like whale men know thing, because you the work that you for a number of reasons, right? But the you know, the work that you're doing is very big, right? It's, you know, you you have to get deep into them. You if, if if it's somebody that you have a previous relationship that, or maybe you knew them from the past, or whatever, they might want more of you. And it works until it doesn't, you know, I think the challenge is that. So I'm not saying it's like you've done anything wrong by getting into that right, because there is some stability in that until there maybe isn't right, like you said, and so, but yeah, I think having the more balanced projects that are and clients that are, you know, maybe not a forever timeframe, timeframe, or just bigger engaged, you know, somewhere in between a minnow and a way a
little bit bigger than a minnow, like,
What if you had some dolphins
9:42
like a dolphin or something. We need some dolphins. How about that? I like that. So. So you're trying to reconnect with who are the clients you want to work with, and what do you want to do with them? Um, and when you start to ask yourself those questions, you know what happens? I go back to
clients where I felt most fulfilled emotionally.
So here she's talking about the clients she really sparks to. And that conversation includes some nuances of her industry, which we've edited out for privacy. Let's get back to it. Okay, so that's one sort of segment, right? So then we go to, like, the next level, right? What are, what is the problem that you want to be solving for these entities? Because there, there will be some overlap, but it's not like every entity is going to have this problem, right?
Painkiller or nice to have
10:47
So what I jotted down, and I'm still, I probably still need to talk to people to see if this is still a painkiller versus a nice to have, is a lot of the startups in this space, they might be blowing through a paid ad budget to attract and retain folks, but they don't know how to staff up there the organic marketing. So I think that the way, I hope out is by stepping in and laying out a process for how you build your brand, so that you don't have to keep throwing money into the paid bucket over and over again and losing folks
that I mean that seems Like a painkiller. Absolutely, yeah, stop throwing money to get, get and keep customers right, and start building lasting relationships. I mean, those are like, there's something there, absolutely that seems like a painkiller.
Yes, I think so. And what I find is that a lot of folks, I might not be the full time hire that they make eventually, but when they're in that trans inflection point, I think it's kind of after they've had a certain round of funding, then they'll need someone to kind of kick start that from them and then hire it, or help hire in a staff or a teamlet to keep it going,
Naming the moment someone needs you
12:21
yeah, yeah. I, you know, it sounds like you have a really good handle on the scenario or the situation that would lead people to need you, right? Because it's not everybody, and it's not all moments of time, right? It reminds me of somebody I worked with who did demand gen for B to B to B, like enterprise startups, enterprise tech startups. And her whole thing was like, I help you turn your Series A round into enterprise pipeline, right? That was, that was literally her painkiller, okay? Statement, because she was very clear that, like before, series A they, they they can't, she can't really do as much for them. And after that, they probably have a whole team. And by the way, she does sometimes work herself out of a job, because part of the the role that you're, you know, part of the contract is that she'll bring on, she'll help them find somebody. Yeah, yeah, right. So I think there's, there is a lot to be said for naming the moment. Okay, and you don't clearly have to be as specific as, like, I turn your Series A round, but you know, something like finally ready to stop throwing money at paid ads is a moment. No, I like that. You know, you had asked me at the beginning, like, is there a training, or is there a module, or something about, like, sort of reconnecting with what you really want to be doing? And there's no, I mean, I don't have a model about that. You have a book in your 60 books, I know I really don't. I mean,
Trial and error, and continual editing out
13:58
how did you find your way into this?
Oh, trial and error and continual editing out is really what it was. You know, I first started my business. I it's funny because, because I went from running my own company as a consultant and we ran this organization also to I worked like a general, like a managing director for a woman who was a consultant and a speaker. And I did that for several years, and then I went out on my own, and I was like, you know, I did what everybody does. I did. I was like, I'm going to solve all the problems for all the people, like my my painkiller statement, or whatever was I help small businesses grow, which is like, you know, what does that even mean? That's like, more vanilla than vanilla ice cream, you know. And then really, what happened was, I went through my LinkedIn one day, or, you know, over a series of days, and I was like, Who can I reach out to, or who would I want to work with? And it was like, no, no. Yeah. Like, no. No, not them, not that not that company, not that problem, whatever. And I realized that, like, I didn't want to just work with anybody. It at that time, I was like, I want to work with women business owners. But again, women business owners is really broad, so I did work with a lot of women business owners, but they over, over time, I was like, a knot. I want to work with women who run consulting and coaching businesses. You know, if you sell a product, I don't really, that's not really my jam. And even then, I did that for several years, and I was like, eventually, I was like, I don't want to help coaches. It's not that I don't want to help coaches. And I thought that I can't help coaches, but the methodology that I teach is just really well suited for consulting, like selling in an expertise based service, right? Of course, executive coaching sort of falls into that realm as well, yeah, but like, I'm not going to help you fill your group program, like group coaching program, or sell an online course or whatever. And so it's like, literally just closer and closer and closer, you know to but I mean literally, the change from, we just scrubbed coaching from our website, I don't know, four months ago, I
was gonna say it's still here and there, so I didn't realize that you made a decision there.
Yes, I did not realize that, yeah, it's still here and there, because, of course, like you, it's so hard.
That's your foundation. One of your well, it's like, it's hard to
Scrubbing words off my own website
16:28
clean up the internet, you know, and like all your little, little digital artifacts, another change we made is we just scrubbed B to B from the website and from all my materials. And it's really interesting, because when I did, it's like, I help coaches and consultants, you know, like, when I I had to have B to B as a qualifier, because I don't want to, I can't, if you do, like, resume writing or career coaching or whatever, I can't really help you. Like, if you work, if you work with individuals, then I needed, but if that's what you did, because you were a coach and you fell into my world, that I needed B to B as like a little qualifier to say, well, not everybody, but once I narrowed it down to consulting, I didn't need that qualifier because it's almost implied,
okay, so you don't have consultants Who do no because if they're doing in the individual stuff, they would call themselves, they would put a coach hat on,
yeah, I don't, I don't do nutrition coaches, right? Resume coaches, career coaches, personal trainers, life coaches, you know, gotcha. But this has been a journey since 2015 I was
gonna say, is it a 10 year journey yet? Not yet we're getting there.
Isn't that crazy. So, so, like I said, there's no specific strategy. There's a process, and the process is essentially doing exactly what you're doing now. What do I like about what I've done. What do I dislike? And I never want to do again. I never want to encounter again. And and really saying, Okay, now what? Because, you know, oftentimes what? What happens when people come to me and they have been essentially responsive to the people who happen to come to them, right? You say yes to this and yes to that, because people know you, or you get referred, or they know that you're good, or whatever, right? And this is an important inflection point when we start this work together, because it's likely the first time that they've ever said, Well, how about how do I want it to be? Right? Yeah, we start to design what you what you want, right? Like, functionally, like, what's the work I want to be doing? Who do I want to be doing it for? Psychographically, like, what type of client is great for me? You know, who, who lights me up, right? What's the working environment that I really enjoy, right? Yeah, and so we pair the things you like from the past and how you want it to be, and that's your, you know, that's your mission. That's our and that's our mission together, because those clients are out there this unique combination of what we're putting together now they're out there. Yeah, we know what we're looking for. Then we can go find them and we can be visible to them. Does that make sense?
Nobody nails it out of the gate
19:28
Totally and I was just wondering, as you're working through this process, some people don't nail it out of the gate, because they have to have client experience and then be like, maybe it's more in this direction or that. So I don't know, like how often you find that reassessing is helpful, but I have a feeling that I don't want to set myself up for not nailing it in the first time, but I have a feeling that it'll be like an iterative thing with me, totally like I was with. For you too.
So absolutely, oh yeah, iterative even. And it still is right as as evidenced by some of the changes we've made recently. And that's why you know, knowing that you kind of have to give yourself permission to not nail it the first time, because you will always get more data. Like, I was convinced, I don't know, three, four years ago, I was like, I've got it. I have a niche. I am super clear about that. This niche is airtight. But guess what? You just get more data. Yeah, you know, well, that's
my problem. I was like,
Do you ever get bored? I think you never get bored because you're always learning, like, literally, you you will never quite stop and and you'll get to the point where you'll be able to tell pretty quickly. Like, is this, is this a good fit or not, you know? And hopefully, if we do our job right, then you'll have enough going on so you can make that determination, because it's really not what satisfies you, and you're not being driven by like, well, I need the work or I need the money. You have enough going on and enough work and enough pipeline that you know you can, you can really make an honest decision. Perfect. So, so, yeah, I mean knowing that it's all iterative. It's all data. You can you can reassess as often as you want. I mean, you don't want to do it like you don't want to be questioning this decision every I guess that's questioning decision. Isn't even the right way of putting it. You don't want to be constantly evaluating because
you have to do a bit of the work.
Make the decision, then stop making the decision
21:42
I'm a, I'm a big fan of, like, make the decision and then stop making the decision. Yeah, right, even on things like, I don't know where are we going out to dinner or and stuff like that, right? Like, make the decision and then stop making the decision, but come back to it after a time, right? And, and at least for me. I mean, I guess going back to the some of the most recent changes we made, I just sort of knew, I just knew it was time.
You know, that's good, and it seems like it coincided with family stuff too. Or was that just coincidental? I think
it's all sort of wrapped up in it. Like, yeah, there's it, you know, I spent 2020 being totally burned out. And, you know, 2021 and so there it's, like, lingering from that, you know, that time frame, and then what we were, what we're going towards, and what I knew was going to be required of me, like, for my family and stuff like that. So, yeah, it's all connected,
yeah, yeah, I'm trying to, I mean, I kind of rattled off what I think is ideal for me, but I have, like, maybe two or three other avenues I want to explore and but the thing that I'm grappling with, which, again, I feel like is a privileged problem, is just A little bit of burnout from the client slash that all happening during covid. It was just yeah, a lot to kind of come off of and then get real hungry again. So, so I'm hoping, I'm hoping that I can kind of at least have one path that I feel pretty good to get started, and then we'll go,
Yeah, well, and also, what needs to happen for you to really heal, you know, is it taking a break? Is it talking to someone? Is it reading books about toxic relationships or whatever? I'm serious, like, you know, we do metabolize it a little bit so that you're not just going from burnout to I think, I think, I don't know, to me, it's all like, how did this happen? How can I prevent it from happening again?
What has to happen before she gets hungry again
23:57
Yeah, I honestly think the work that we're doing will help me kind of crystallize that,
yes, and the on the professional level, that's, you know, that's one level, but on the personal level too, right? I got out of a really toxic romantic relationship, and I spent a long time in therapy, just trying to, just exploring, right? How did, what about me created the conditions for me to participate in this? Yeah, right. And so I think there's an element of that too, you know, yeah, not not, and not with an angle of, like, blaming, but we participate on some level in the relationships that are around us, right? So anyway, I think that's so. So I think the work that we're doing on essentially creating your division of your future is is going to be supported by anything that you want to do personally, to clear the decks, to. Make sense, yeah, yeah, no.
My take: you gather data, you don't think it through
25:04
Okay, well, yeah, tell me. So, yay, therapy, like therapy, metabolizing,
right, right? Yeah. Okay, so, so, I think what would be a good continuation of this exercise is, you know, think about what we've been doing, right? What do you like that you want to keep? How do you like? What's meaningful to you and also like, what do you want? Because you really do get to write your future right now. You know, of course, there are things from the past clients and past work that are exciting and fun, and you don't want to let those go, but you're not beholden to that. You You really get to write your future. So what does that look like? And then we'll take that to things like your painkiller statement or your LinkedIn or your what have you right? Okay? And so once you have that, bring it to a coaching call or to Slack, and you know, this is what I'm putting out into the universe that I want, and even better than putting it out in the universe, we're going to like make it happen. So I hope you got some things from that conversation, and thanks for letting me pull back the curtain a bit and show you my own process. And I want to pull out a lesson that you can apply to your business, which is that honing your ideal client really is an evolution. I talk to a lot of women who say to me, I know I need to start putting myself out there. I know I need to start talking to people. I know I need to do something. I know, I know, I know, and on and on and on, but I can't because, and this is the line, because I haven't figured out my ideal client yet. And I've talked to women who have been saying the same things to themselves for months or even years, and not having figured out their ideal client yet becomes this thing that keeps them stuck right. Just really keeps them from moving forward at all. And they can't solve it. They can't get out of that. And they stay stuck because they think that the way to solve it is to think about it more. But the truth is that you don't figure out your ideal client by thinking about it. You figure it out by starting somewhere and then gathering data. And you gather more data by talking to people, taking on clients, taking on work. That's data that informs your ideal client, and I know that so many of us are used to figuring things out by thinking about them, right? Of course, you're super smart. You can figure things out with your brain, right? And that served you really well in a lot of areas. But you don't solve this problem by thinking about it. You do it by gathering data. And it's an evolution. You heard me say that even years later, even today, I'm still gathering data and still getting clearer on who I can help the most and who I want to help. So if you're feeling stuck because you know you should be doing something proactively for business development, you should be doing something to get new consulting clients, but you haven't figured out your ideal client yet, I want you to know that that doesn't have to be the thing that keeps you stuck. There's an easy way to get yourself unstuck so you can move forward, but you'll never get there if you aren't willing to start somewhere. Hey, everything we're talking about in this episode is part of the system women like you are learning in the academy. In the Academy, we help women consultants install the two systems every B to B consultant needs a marketing system to consistently attract the right clients and a sales system to lead a sales process to a yes and get paid more for every contract. So even if you've only gotten clients through referrals or word of mouth in the academy, you'll learn how to attract and sign clients outside your network, how to lead a sales process with confidence, and how to get paid for your value, not your time. And there's no cold calling or cold emailing involved, no changing your services or making a course, and you won't use any pushy sales tactics. That's just not our vibe. So if you like what you've heard here, the academy may be your right next step to learn how you can get these two systems in your consulting business and make progress faster and with fewer roadblocks. Head to smart gets paid.com/academy and apply, and we can chat about next steps. All right. See you over there. You. Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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